Mother
Mother is an improvisational comedy group formed in the Summer of 1999 http://www.motherimprov.com/. Its nine members are Scot Armstrong, Tara Copeland, Jon Daly, James Eason, Jesse Falcon, Jason Mantzoukas, Doug Moe, Jessica St. Clair, and Christine Walters. They performed regularly to sold-out houses at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in New York Cityhttp://newyork.ucbtheatre.com/shows/117 from their inception until their finale' on September 27, 2008. http://newyork.ucbtheatre.com/shows/1863. History One of the last, if not the last, UCB Theater Harold Team assembled by Armando Diaz. At the outset, Mother's Harolds were either very strong or burned themselves out about midway through. When they were good, they were terrific. When they were bad, they were still funnier than Suppertime. Within their largely successful first year together, Mother set their sites on developing their own show. They decided to rehearse twice a week - one rehearsal for Harold night (with Andrew Secunda) and one for their show (with Armando Diaz). Secunda helped Mother to focus their individual and group talents to do more consistently rewarding Harolds. With the assistance of Armando Diaz, they created a new longform, the Sleep Over in the summer of 2001. They performed it for over two years at the UCBT in the show Wanna Sleep Over?. The form was created to force Mother into new improv territory -- less like magpies chasing a bright shiny object or a "Big Bang" of ideas and more focused on character and behavior. Thanks to this form, Mother became the biggest proponents at the UCBT of incorporating acting chops, emotional truth, and games based more on character and behavior rather than solely premise-based games into their improv work. They later developed The Soundtrack with the assistance of Kurt Braunohler. The Soundtrack ran at the UCBT from 2003-2008. They performed both forms, on separate occasions, at the Chicago Improv Festival. In 2005, Mother won the Chicago Improv Festival Super Cage Match Championship, becoming the first New York City team to do so. This garnered the attention of Malcolm Gladwell, who profiled them in his book Blink (2005). Gladwell, Malcolm. Blink. pg 44. Cagematch They were the team that ended Neutrino's infamous first Cagematch winning streak. Expanding upon the Timeout tradition, Mother came up with more conceptual and Kaufman-esque timeouts before losing in a controversial psuedo-threeway Cagematch with Respecto Montalban and Neutrino. Despite "retiring" from Cage Match, a competitive UCBT improv show since 2005, Mother holds the records for All-Time Vote Leader (2678) and Most All-Time Wins (49) in the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre's Cage Match. http://cage-match.com/index.php?option=records Coaches Over the course of their tenure at the UCB Theatre, Mother has been coached by: Armando Diaz, Ian Roberts, Andrew Secunda, Patrick McCartney, Michael Delaney, Kevin Mullaney, Eric Davis, Ed Herbstman, Kurt Braunholer. Theaters In addition to starting at the UCB Theater (161 W. 22nd St.), Mother has performed at: Freaks Local 413, Flint Youth Center (Flint, MI), Athanaeum Theatre (Chicago), The Sanford Meisner Theatre (11th Ave. bet. 22nd/23rd St.), IO (Chicago), Maverick Theatre (NYC), Chelsea Theatre, Axis Theatre (a 6-story walk up and temporary UCBT home while the UCB hunted for a new theater), Above Kleptomania, UCB Theatre (W. 26th St.) Category:Improv Groups Category:New York City Category:UCB-NY Harold Teams